This type of problem is usually related to the Permalinks section in WordPress Settings and the .htaccess file it manipulates. I checked out the current .htaccess file, recreated it, restored an old version from backup to compare and tried various structural settings within the admin section (default works, but I want my standard day and name URLs that match what Google has indexed).

What’s weird is that pagination within category pages works fine (i.e. – 7minutemiles.com/category/golf/page/2 for example). My web server log isn’t throwing any errors and seems to be configured the same as it ever was (no recent upgrades). I did have a few Jetpack plugin upgrades recently, but deactivating that made no difference. I’m also not using any add-in pagination plugins.

A WordPress support site had a few threads mentioning that the 3.4 upgrade changed some things with pagination, but I’m pretty sure it was working since I moved to the 3.4.x series (currently on 3.4.2). My issue is a little different than that post, plus you wouldn’t think you’d need a function.php fix for basic pagination on the home page. Here is my theme PHP code that generates the link:

next_posts_link('« Older posts')

That generates the right URL, so I’m confused as to whether this is a WordPress issue or an Apache issue. Guess I’ll look at it with fresh eyes tomorrow…